Of Dragons & Love
by Don't Abandon Hope
Summary: An Inheritance OneShot: Basically what I think should have happened when Fírnen hatched for Arya


The little green dragon tripped over a branch upon the forest floor and tumbled to the ground in a tangle of wings and limbs. He let out a dejected sigh and remained as he was; sprawled out across the narrow path. Above him he heard a tinkle of laugh and his heart soared as the reason for his existence gathered him up into her arms and cradled him close. He wriggled with pleasure and nestled his face against hers.

"What will I do with you?" she asked, smiling at him.

She turned and continued walking through the pines; he was nestled safely in her arms and surveyed his surroundings with interest before clambering up to rest, curled, around her shoulders. "Nothing of course," she was saying, "For I love you just as you are my dragon."

She often did this; speaking a one-sided conversation and it filled him completely to know that she always, no matter what, included him. He knew that one day he would answer her back, but the words had not yet begun to register in his infantile mind and so he just listened and sent her impressions through their link between minds. At this he sent her a query, a wondering as to their destination.

"It's a surprise," she told him, eyes twinkling, "although for me I wish it were not so; I wish I did not have to walk this path alone." Radiating through their connection he determined a great sadness within her and that upset him greatly. No one would ever upset his Rider! "Oh my dragon!" she laughed and then stopped, a frown creasing her face as a thought occurred to her then; "you need a name."

A name! What a wondrous prospect … to have a name!

Arya laughed again. He loved her laugh and her joy, for it undoubtedly slipped through to become his own and he loved that. Loved that they were together. For she was the reason of his existing and the reason of his hatching … when he grew big and strong like the dragons in her memories he would never, ever, let anyone hurt her like that bad-not-elf-or-human-spirit-creature-Durza had done to her.

She sighed and continued their walk. "But I am not alone am I?" picking up the half conversation she'd left off before digressing upon the need to name him, "Nor will I ever be again; for I have you do I not?" Arya looked at him, her eyes the colour of his scales filled with a joy and pleasure so intense it swallowed him up. He wriggled and squirmed and swooped to the nearest branch and back to her again.

"Yes," Arya murmured as she pushed aside an overhanging branch, "I have you for always … and now my heart … my heart is it full?" She was now speaking more to herself than to him, yet he did not care for the sound of her voice was all he needed. "I do not know; surely it should be? I have you do I not … then why is there this feeling that something is missing? I grieve for her I know – but does my heart yearn for her or for another? My heart should be full with you …"

He didn't understand what she was speaking of, the ways of the heart too complex for him to comprehend yet he could appreciate that sense of yearning for something unknown for he himself yearned to meet the dragons in her memories … not that black one she'd slain. His thoughts stopped and he felt a great sadness upon him that such an act had occurred; he knew from her mind that the black dragon had been a bad dragon, but it still did not seem right to him. Arya was looking at him, sorrow in her eyes, as she clearly knew where it was his thoughts had taken him.

"I know," she said, "but I had no choice; Shruikan had to die … Galbatorix had twisted him too much for redemption … forgive me will you?"

Of course he forgave her! He would _always_ forgive her.

She smiled. "I am glad."

A squirrel scampered across the branch and he pounced, but missed and the branch broke. The squirrel jumped across to safety while the little green dragon went crashing to the floor. Another dejected sigh escaped him … how was he to be a fearsome dragon like that big-golden-scale-father-sun-dragon? Or that smaller-but-still-bigger-than-him blue-gem-scales-that-sparkle-in-light-and-the-dark-dragon?

"You'll learn," Arya told him, crouching down beside him and gently removing bits of twig and branch that had clung to him, "just as they both did; they were hatchlings once too you know."

That seemed absurd! How could they have _ever_ been as small as he was now? And how would he ever grow to be so big and powerful and graceful? Then an image floated across his half-formed mind and he knew it came from his Rider. An egg – like his own – yet blue, blue like the scales of that she-dragon who was bonded with his Rider's bestest of friends. Blue and so hard and yet so clear and like sapphire – he'd seen a sapphire yesterday; the blacksmith-Rhunön-with-no-manners had shown him one.

"Saphira hatched from that," she told him. "So she must've been as small as you are now mustn't she?"

He had to agree.

"Good; now come on before someone tells Däthedr where we are. If he asks of me to take up that crown once more I fear I may do him injury today!"

That had to be avoided, because he knew Arya actually quite liked Däthedr-elf and wouldn't want to hurt him in any way. Although if Däthedr-elf didn't stop pestering Arya then he might have to take steps and chase him away … he amused himself as he scampered behind her, of chasing Däthedr-elf away with his sharp talons and claws – although he couldn't breathe fire yet which wasn't fair. Fire was the best part of being a dragon!

Arya laughed again at him and turned on her heel several feet ahead to watch him jump lightly into the air and into her arms. "When you're older," she promised, "you will be as fearsome as any dragon ever was! But enough; we are here."

Here didn't seem that impressive for the hatchling. He gazed about but saw nothing to mark this part of the forest as any different from the rest. She pointed at a tree, young compared by the rest around it, and told him it was a cherry tree for her mother had, in life, sustained a love for the little fruit above all others. Then she pointed to one beside it, this much older and told her hatchling that was a maple tree, strong and tall and proud as her father had been …

Arya sat down cross-legged between them both and watched as he scampered off to explore. He wondered why they were here, but it was only a wonder for there were many aspects of this new part of the leafy city he'd not seen before. "Stay away from the stream!" she called, and naturally he veered directly towards it and promptly fell in. "I warned you!"

It took him three attempts to clamber out, and by the time he had he was rather put out that Arya had chosen to remain sitting where she was, with mirth shining in her eyes. He shook the water from his scales and looked at her, his head cocked, as he regarded his Rider. Then he launched himself at her, pushing her to the floor upon her back and she laughed in delight though it was laced with a pain and loss he didn't understand. Ever since hatching for her, she had that in her and he didn't understand how she could be so utterly happy yet so deeply sad at the same time.

A small field mouse caught his attention, and this time he was determined to be the unbeatable hunter he was. The little green dragon swooped after his prey and it was only Arya's, sorrow filled cry that brought him up short. "Don't leave me!"

When he returned, slightly bitter about once again letting his prey escape him, he noticed something wrong with her. Her face was wet and some kind of liquid appeared to be spilling from her eyes. Curiosity aroused he marched forwards and licked one of them off her cheek. Then the cringed for it was salty and not at all nice to drink. But she was sad. So very sad … and he wanted to know why she was always so sad when he was always with her.

So scooped him up in her arms and buried her face against his warm scaly neck and began to shake, her shoulders and her body trembling as a great overwhelming despair threatened to consume her. It alarmed him greatly; he didn't know what to do! Why was she so distressed? He sent to her all the love that he had for her and nestled ever closer to her as cries tore from her throat and that strange salty water dripped onto his clean emerald scales.

"Oh my dragon," she said finally, straightening up and giving him a small smile. Her eyes were red and lines from the salty-not-nice-tasting-eye-water had stained her cheeks. "Forgive me please … you do not understand and that is wrong of me. More than ever I wish them here you see; my parents … my mother and my father … and while I come here to sit between what is left of them, I cannot feel them … they are not here."

He slumped to the floor and rested his head upon her leg, staring up at her with a patience of one whom wanted to learn. He would always listen to his Arya.

"What would you say Mother?" she was asking now, looking at the earth beneath the young cherry tree. "What would you say to my becoming a Rider? Would it fill you with pride? Or would you turn me away as you did before … when I strayed from the path you had laid out before me?"

Arya turned to the other tree, "And what of you my Father? Are you, wherever that may be, even now filled with a glowing pride at your only child been chosen as I have? Or do you wish me to take up your seat in Mother's stead? I do not know … I cannot know …"

The hatchling shifted and looked from one tree to another, but surely his Rider's parents weren't trees were they? They were elves … he'd seen the memories. Arya laughed through her pain at his infantile musing.

"No; they were elves and alive and tall and strong … and they died. Oh Fírnen –" she stopped dead and cocked her head at him, a smile now lighting her features. "I do not know where that came from," she admitted, "but the name seems to fit does it not? Would you like it, to be called Fírnen my dragon?"

_Fírnen_. He tried the name out and his voice echoed through their link as he said, _Am I Fírnen?_

_Fírnen my dragon …_

Yes, he liked to be called Fírnen.

"Then Fírnen it is." Fírnen hummed with satisfaction. "But when they die, my people, we burry them in the earth," she told Fírnen, stroking his head with her soft fingers and staring out into the forest. "And plant a tree to mark their grave … look around my Fírnen … can you not see the diversity in this part of Du Weldenvarden? We sit in a grave of my ancestors, of my house and family … once did we stand tall and proud but alas am I all that now remains."

Fírnen thought that wasn't true because he was as part of her family as she was his. Arya smiled some more.

"Not all perhaps … yet I wonder how my family would've reacted to you Fírnen." He knew the answer to that of course; they would love him just as surely as she did. "But Fírnen I miss them; I miss her … my mother … it seems strange. Now I grieve for her and miss her yet I knew in my heart that one of us would not be surviving that battle. I thought it would be me – for I was following him into the heart of danger …"

A breeze wafted through the clearing and Fírnen shifted his tiny weight to the right slightly, not that he had to, but he'd seen, in his Rider's memories, the other dragons all doing that and so he thought that he too, should. It seemed pointless to him and he decided not to do it again because it just made him look silly and ridiculous.

"Ill tidings were they that brought the news of her fate to me … and I did not and nor do I know how to feel. Fírnen tell me how to feel."

But he knew no more than she did.

"At least," Arya said, "you are once more together. Though a hundred years separated you at last once more do you lie side by side … and I sit as I remember doing so as a child, between you … talking aimlessly to the forest while you do not listen."

A snapping of a twig made them both jump and Fírnen turned his head and growled a tiny, yet impressive, growl at the intruder. Whoever it was bowed and murmured, "Forgive my intrusion Princess … dragon …" before stalking back into the forest on light feet.

"They call me 'Princess'," she laughed bitterly, "I much prefer 'Rider' Fírnen. Though I have but for a week only been as such and yet a 'princess' all my life." Fírnen watched her, wondering where her thoughts were going to take her now, and aware that he was most likely going to be lost to them soon enough.

"What do I do?" she asked him.

He didn't know; how would he know? He was only a hatchling, he didn't know anything much other than his name – Fírnen – and that he loved her with all his being. Wasn't that all that mattered? All that counted?

"Do I take her place? Mother do I take your place?" she asked the cherry tree, "For they want me to, I know. It is what you have wanted of me all my life is it not? To carry on your legacy … Father's legacy … and that of our family's … but can I do it? Why do I feel a reluctance upon me to say I will do it?"

Fírnen didn't want Arya to do anything she didn't want to do; he knew _that_ much too. She glanced at him inquiringly before placing her lips to his snout for a moment. The gesture confused him but he realised it was an act of love and affection and squirmed with pleasure at it. Arya laughed lightly, picking him up into her arms again.

"What would you say of him Father? Would you be pleased? Would he warm your heart as he does mine? Fírnen my dragon … he will grow tall and proud do you not think so Father? And Mother … can you not see in him that which you saw in me? Wilful I know, but so full of hope and so young … did I not once have that Mother?"

Arya's words had already confused Fírnen but just hearing her voice filled him with a glow and the knowledge that she loved him and always would no matter what was enough. Impulsively he scampered off round the two trees and his Rider, gleefully playing among the leaves and branches and soft loam as Arya watched and continued to speak to the trees.

"I cannot do it Mother," she was whispering. "And do not think that I cast aside who I am just for Fírnen because even if he had not chosen me … I have long since wondered from the path you wished me to take. We both knew that didn't we? Was that why we argued so much – unable to tell the other that we were too alike – and so we argued because I was straying into the unknown … upon a road you had not walked before me …"

Fírnen paused to survey a line of ants climbing a long stalk of grass and sniffed at them. They scattered terrified as he swatted at the grass and then proceeded to snap at it with his teeth. Then he jumped back in alarm as an ugly creature with eight legs covered in fur scuttled across the path in front of him and disappeared under a pile of leaves. Intrigued Fírnen chased after the thing, batting aside the leaves until he found it lurking in a hole in the roots of the tree where he could not reach. A huff of smoke left his nostrils and accidently engulfed the creature. It lunged at him and bit him upon the snout. Fírnen backed away, not in any way hurt, but with his ego in tatters.

Arya had been watching him. She shook her head and then crawled towards him, laying sprawled out on her front between the two trees, as she brushed the bit on Fírnen's nose and healed it away with a few gentle words. He nudged her before going back to his exploration of the grave garden that contained his Arya's family. "No. I will not do it … do you agree Fírnen? I will not be queen. A Rider should not rule; lead yes … but never rule."

Through their link he realised that some kind of weight had been lifted from his Rider as she made that decision. Fírnen didn't really care so long as they were together; he was much too young to make such choices so he trusted entirely important decisions to Arya. He always would. She was his everything.

Fírnen padded back to Arya, who was still lying on her front propped up on her elbows. "Now then my Fírnen. How shall we spend our days you and I?"

He huffed, smoke once again emitting from his nostrils and engulfing her. She coughed and complained in a loving tone and he felt a sense of mischief grow as his own amusement at her predicament. All he wanted was to be with her. That all.

"Of course we shall be together; that is, after all, a given …" she rolled onto her back and gazed up at the sky. Fírnen jumped into it, spreading out his wings and soaring round the clearing taking care to remain in her view because the sky was incomplete without him in it.

"It is strange," she called up to him. "For I now understand how Eragon feels towards Saphira. I knew of the bond between dragon and Rider for sure, but now … now I share it I understand the completeness it brings. Fírnen the world was empty before you … how full it seems now that you are here to share it with."

_Eragon_? He questioned and dropped to the ground again. She rolled to her front, resting her head in her arms as she looked at him. It was strange, the emotions that name sparked in her and Fírnen wondered at it. She didn't react so to anyone else's name – nor did her body for that matter. Her emotions confused him. _Eragon._

"Now that's not fair!" she huffed. "You say his name and your own, yet you have yet to use mine!"

Fírnen found that funny and said the name again,_ Eragon._ The reaction from her gave him no small sense of curiosity … and a little bit of envy too. Why didn't his own name make a warm glow inside her chest as that other Rider's did?

Arya looked at him, "You have nothing to be envious of Fírnen … Let me tell you of him shall I? Of Eragon Shadeslayer the son of Brom …" Fírnen settled down beside her, curled tightly in a ball as he gazed into his Rider's eyes filled with love. Love for him … and for that Rider too.

"He is my best friend … my closest friend and my dearest of companions. I trust him with all that I am Fírnen, as I do you." She reached out and poked him gently in the side. "He is whom I turn to when the world seems at fault … whenever something happens I turn to where he is beside me – to where I feel he belongs – for I wish only to share it all with him." Arya spoke in a gentle voice, and Fírnen listened but didn't quite understand. How could she love so many people? His heart had only room for her.

"To share everything and anything with him … the big and the small … without him," her tone had taken a pondering tone, "without him the big becomes insignificant and yet with him the small is always important … oh Fírnen; how he stole away my heart that day he opened my cell in Gil'ead … I can see that now. Only … only I did not notice for I had taken his in return." Arya looked at Fírnen intently, imploring him to understand.

Fírnen knew she had not spoken these words before, not examined what the other Rider meant to her before because she had not needed to. But then he chose her and now she shared everything with Fírnen she had to try and explain it all to him.

"Fírnen," Arya spoke urgently. "Fírnen … it has not been _my_ heart I've been so closely guarding these past years; it has been his. Do you see that? I do … I see that now … know that now. If this is love …" she faltered and pushed herself upon her elbows. Fírnen scrambled to his feet and her head was on a level with his own as she continued. "So be it … so be it Fírnen I love him!"

A wild joy spread between them – he understood little of her emotions and her words … but enough to know that she was happy. So utterly happy. "And how could I not?" she asked, carrying on though the hatchling struggled to keep up with her thoughts as they raced through her, round her head and through their link. "When we have endured all that we have together? How could I do anything other than fall for him as I have? Eragon … _Eragon_ … Fírnen I love him."

Love … but did this mean she no longer loved him? He was lost … he was confused …

Arya leapt lightly to her feet and swept her into his arms. "Oh Fírnen … my Fírnen … you are too young to understand; I love you and I love him. Can you not find it within you to share me? For Saphira will have to share Eragon …"

He loved Arya; Arya was _his_ Rider. No one else could have that or take that. He had hatched for her and he would protect her for ever and ever and ever. She was _his._

"Yes. And you are mine … and no one will take this from us. But Fírnen have heart and forgive me but I can no longer deny my heart; I love him."

Fírnen supposed that was alright; this Eragon was, after all, a Rider too so he would understand wouldn't he that Arya was Fírnen's before she was Eragon's.

"Exactly," Arya approved and her joy and sheer happiness filled him and completed him. He let out a little roar of joy and swooped round her several times before he veered unexpectedly into a tree and crumpled to the ground. Arya skipped lightly to him and righted him. "But Fírnen you can tell no one; no one must know of my heart. Hush," for he had keened in confusion, "hush it'll be our secret yes? Yours and mine. I love Eragon, you must know I do, but we must not tell anyone before I am certain he truly loves me too. You and I do not want me hurt do we?"

No. No he didn't want her hurt. So yes; yes it would be their secret. So for now she remained only his and he liked that; that was how the world should be. His Arya picked him up in her arms again and headed back the way they came. She stopped at the edge of the clearing and spoke again to the cherry tree and the maple tree.

"Mother … Father … you will not approve, I think, of my choice … but what can you do about it? You are both dead, are you not? No matter how much I wish it were not so, dead you will remain and I … I shall join the ranks of the Dragon Riders with Fírnen at my side … and I shall love the man who saved the world, be it as my best friend or be it as more; only time will tell me so … but I will forever remain your daughter, Mother. Arya Islanzadísdaughter am I now and Dröttningu no more."

If he was honest with himself, Fírnen did not understand most of what Arya had said in that clearing; she'd made some important decisions he knew that, and though he had not been much of a help, he liked to think he'd helped her best he could. A torrent of confusing emotions and feelings were swirling around Arya and they unsettled Fírnen that she could have so much on her mind at once yet function so readily. Maybe when he was older and no longer just a hatchling, would he understand everything about his beloved Rider.

_Arya._

A smile light her face as he said her name.

_Arya._

_Fírnen._

_Arya._

_Fírnen._

_Arya._

_Fírnen._

_Arya._

He knew she was just humouring him as she endlessly repeated his name as he was hers, but he didn't care because she didn't have to think about it and nor did he. He knew her and she knew him and she would always have him and he would always have her. That was a given.

Fírnen thought of blue-scales-Saphira; he then squirrelled away all Arya's memories of her to keep as his own for she was an undoubtedly fine dragon to behold … Fírnen didn't think much of her Rider, but he seemed pleasing enough for Arya so the green hatchling supposed that was alright and that this Eragon _had_ saved the world so at least he knew this Rider would also be able to protect his Arya like he did.

"Fírnen," Arya murmured then, "our secret yes? You tell no one of my love for Eragon and I will tell no one that you are fantasising about his dragon."

Fírnen huffed in embarrassment as he realised his thoughts had not been private and that Arya had been watching his imagination spin tales of himself great and big and majestic and blue-scales-Saphira soaring through the skies together.

_Our secret_. He tried out the words.

_Yes Fírnen, our secret … now hush; the Meona Tree is up ahead and a gathering taking place._

Fírnen didn't really know what the elves were all wanting from Arya when she joined the crowd at the bottom of the really big tree, but he settled upon a branch and watched as she obliged them and sung a song. Fírnen liked hearing her sing. Then when she had finished she shook her head and said, as she had when she'd been sitting between her mother's-tree and father's-tree; "A Rider should not rule … lead yes, but never rule. Has the past century with that Oath-breaker upon the throne in Urû'baen proven nothing to you? I will not rule you … I cannot."

Fírnen couldn't understand why they kept asking her when she'd already said she didn't want to do it. Why did they want to make her do something she didn't want to? That wasn't fair! No one should do something if they didn't want to … Arya glanced up at him and smiled, beckoning him to her. He jumped off the branch and settled upon her shoulder.

"Enough. Fírnen would like to hear a tale or two from old times, if that is not too much to ask?" She looked at the elves surrounding and they instantly nominated a male with hair like starlight. Fírnen didn't remember asking for a tale, whatever that was; he already had a tail – a fine one too – but he realised it meant something different and his curiosity was once again aroused.

Arya sat at the bottom of the Meona Tree with Fírnen in her lap as the other elves all mimicked her save for the one in the centre of the circle. "Now then …" he said, "What do I spin a story of I wonder?"

"Of dragons." Fírnen looked approvingly at his Rider. Yes he would like to hear all about dragons from before.

"Of love," someone else called out.

"Of dragons and love you say … well then," The elf looked around, "I have a tale for you; never before been uttered in full … let me begin." He looked at Fírnen and then at his Rider and nodded, a small smirk on his face and Fírnen saw a faint tinge of red upon Arya's cheeks. "In a village, nestled within the reaches of the Spine, lived a boy who stumbled upon something that forever changed his life and the lives of all within that village in the mountains …"


End file.
